Maspeth High School Cheats For The Illusion Of Success

Maspeth high school has been accused of cheating to jack up their academic success.   This Queens high school has been written about previously in my blog and others  for the high percentage and abuse of untenured teachers along with financial shenanigans.  Now columnist Susan Edelman of the New York Post has written an article that exposed the school's manipulation of the school's graduation rate and Regents passing percentage..

Despite the various issues at Maspeth High School over the years the DOE has never bothered to seriously investigate the founding Principal, Khurshid Abdul-Mutakabbir or his assistant principals despite the various questions about how the school is run by parents, students, and teachers.   I was at Maspeth High School for a month a couple of years ago and read my experiencel Here. 

Maspeth high school will cheat to continue the illusion of success and the DOE will do nothing about it.  Read the New York Post Editorial Board opinion.

Read one student's story how the school graduated him six months early despite hardly attending class.

Queens High Schools Students Should Avoid

The 2md Round of 2019 high school student vacancies are now available and you can see the complete list   What is quite obvious is that the most student vacancies are in schools with a 90% or more Black and Hispanic student population.  Moreover, these high schools are academically struggling and many students are subject to poverty.  In addition, these schools have high ELL and Sp Ed populations as well as having high teacher turnover.  Finally, some high schools refused to show vacancies by claiming they are continuing to recruit students. To check other years from 2015 to 2018 you can find them Here, Here, Here, and Here.

This is the list of Queens High Schools with the most student vacancies in the 2nd round.


School..............................................Vacancies

Long Island City.......................................505
John Adams.............................................395
Grover Cleveland.....................................350 
 Flushing.................................................245
Newtown................................................195 
Hillcrest.................................................180
August Martin.........................................170
Martin Van Buren....................................165
Humanities And Arts...............................165

William Cullen Bryant..............................145
Mathematics, Science, and Tech..............100
Pathways Collegiate Prep Academy..........95
George Washington Carver......................95
Excelsior Preparatory ............................90
HS of Law Enforcement...........................80
International HS For Health Sciences.......60 
Queens Preparatory Academy.................60  
Rockaway Park.......................................60
Rockaway Collegiate..............................60
Fredrick Douglas Academy VI.................60
Benjamin Franklin.................................50
Richmond Hill........................................50



If you look at the list you can see many of the schools are in Southeast Queens and the now disbanded Renewal Schools.

It needs to be noted that these vacancies are the minimum available since the DOE list stops at 40 vacancies.  Some of these schools might have double or even triple the amount of vacancies listed on the DOE website.

Read my other posts that list the Queens high schools that students avoid 2018, 2017, 2016, and 2015.. Here, Here,  Here, and Here.

No Bullying At Hillcrest High School - Yeah Right

Hillcrest High School is notorious for not reporting incidents and even received an award for being a "safe school".  Once again, Hillcrest High School has made the newspapers by not reporting one single incident of bullying, even when 18% of the student body admitted they were bullied by fellow classmates.

Hillcrest High School is not alone, 669 other schools joined them by not reporting any bullying incidents.  That is more than a third of the 1,600 schools in the NYC Public School System.

Hillcrest High School has been in the newspapers before.  One was an Assistant Principal who allegedly bedded female teachers in exchange for professional perks.  Another was the Principal who let students pass online courses without a teacher. Then there was the case of the "Vampire Girl", which was never reported since the Principal claimed it didn't happen in the building.

Hillcrest High School is only one of many schools that fail to report not only bullying incidents but other  other forms of violence and misbehavior as principals do not want their schools labeled as a problem school.

Student Discipline Is Out Of Control In NYC Schools

The Blasio administration crowed that suspensions were down 50% and restorative justice programs were a success.  The truth is that if you ask the teachers, their school student discipline is out of control and that principals cannot suspend a student without the DOE's approval.  Moreover, the restorative justice programs are a joke as the misbehaving students quickly realize that there is little consequence for their misbehavior.  Finally, the allowing of cellphones bring chaos and distractions to the classroom.  Even the usually clueless UFT President Michael Mulgrew agreed that student discipline in NYC schools are out of control.

When I first started teaching a student that curses at a teacher would be suspended.  A student threatened a teacher would be arrested, and a student who was insubordinate to a teacher would get after school suspension.  Now all three student actions result in no consequences.  Combine that with the DOE's "blame the teacher for everything" mindset and the poor quality of administrators, especially the Leadership Academy principals, and the result is a chaotic school environment.

Just read these articles Here and Here. and this teacher won a "substantial settlement" from the DOE because of misbehaving students and incompetent school administrators Here.

You can read some of my previous posts dealing with student discipline Here, Here and Here.

Do Not Apply To These Queens High Schools

If I was a parent of a academically proficient child, here is my list of Queens high schools I would not have my middle school; student apply to,

School..................................Graduation..College Ready..Metric

Fredrick Douglas Academy VI.....43%.........11%........3.9
Academy of Medical Technology.73%.........22%........3.3
August Martin............................72%.........28%........2.6
Martin Van Buren.......................72%.........28%........2.6
Rockaway Collegiate.... .............67%.........26%........2.6
Pathways To College..................60%.........28%........2.5
HS of Law Enforcement...............79%.........38%.......2.1
Cambria Heights Academy..........83%.........39%.......2.1
Epic HS South.............................67%.........32%.......2.1
Flushing.....................................62%.........32%.......1.9
Community Leadership................91%........47%.......1.9
Rockaway Park............................67%........36%.......1.9
Humanities and Arts....................80%........43%.......1.9
George Washington Carver..........75%........39%.......1.9
Benjamin Franklin.......................80%........44%.......1.8
Richmond Hill..............................71%........42%.......1.7
Grover Cleveland........................63%........40%.......1.7 
John Adams...............................72%.........42%.......1.7
Queens High School of Teaching..91%.........53%......1.7
Queens Preparatory Academy.....67%.........39%......1.7
Hillside Arts And Letters.............88%..........52%......1.7 
Long Island City.........................76%..........46%......1.7
QIRT..........................................82%..........50%......1.6
Hillcrest.....................................71%..........44%......1.6
Excelsior Prep............................81%..........52%......1.6
Queens Collegiate......................88%..........56%......1.6
Applied Communications............87%..........56%......1.6
Math, Science, and Research......71%..........47%......1.5
Epic HS North.............................88%..........57%......1.5 

The higher the metric, the worse the school is academically and the more likely the school is a diploma mill that no parent should send their academically proficient child to..

Note: the Renewal High Schools are over represented on the list. Moreover,eleven of the twelve small schools at the Beach Channel, Far Rockaway, Campus Magnet, and Jamaica campuses are included on the "do not apply" list  Only Channel View, which is a partially screened school, escaped the list






.

The Bronx And Brooklyn Have The Most Struggling Schools According To The State.

New York State Education Department (NYSED) has listed 124 New York City Public Schools as struggling when it comes to academic achievement.   Most of the struggling schools in the lowest tier are in the Bronx (37) and Brooklyn (28).  By contrast, Manhattan has (13), Queens (5), and Staten Island (1).

 Queens, schools in need of academic improvement are as follows:

Queens
FLUSHING HIGH SCHOOL
JHS 226 VIRGIL I GRISSON
ACADEY OF MEDICAL TECHNOLOGY – A COLLEGE BOARD SCHOOL
CATHERINE AND COUNT BASIE MIDDLE SCHOOL 72
IS 59 SPRINGFIELD GARDENS
IS 238 SUSAN B ANTHONY ACADEMY
WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT HIGH SCHOOL

Interestingly, many of the schools listed are in the Renewal program.  Moreover, in the lowest tier these are the Queens schools.

Queens
INTERNATIONAL HIGH SCHOOL FOR HEALTH SCIENCES
NORTH QUEENS COMMUNITY HIGH SCHOOL
FREDERICK DOUGLASS ACADEMY VI HIGH SCHOOL
QUEENS UNITED MIDDLE SCHOOL
EAGLE ACADEMY FOR YOUNG MEN HIGH SCHOOL

According to New York City, they will do the following to get these schools off the struggling list.

• Curriculum changes.
• Alternative discipline methods.
• Paying teachers more

 Missing are what's really needed:

• Lower class sizes.
• Experienced teachers.
• More stringent student discipline. 
• Prohibit student cellphone use in schools.
• Better school administrators.

An entire list of struggling schools can be found in Chatkbeat

Maspeth High School, Just Say No To Any Vacancy. .

Back in 2012 I had the displeasure of being assigned to Maspeth High School for a month.  What were my observations of the school at that time?  Here is what I found.

• The entire staff was composed of "newbies".
• Few lasted to achieve tenure at the school.
• Teachers had to wear name tags  to differentiate between staff and students.
• Staff was unfriendly and forced to do extra unpaid periods. 
• Students complained  about not having experienced teachers.
• Administration will write up ATRs for any violations of the contract.
• All students had to to take four years of Latin to keep out "undesirable"" students.
• Chapter leaders lasted only one year as they were targeted by the Administration. 

The post I published about Maspeth High School back in 2016 can be found Here.

 Have things changed at Maspeth High School?  Nope.  Here is what a teacher wrote about the school in the Organizer.

•  Is the staff friendly?  No
• Most of the staff is not tenured.
• Many teachers hired are right out of college,
• Staff must do unpaid work.
• Administration uses Danielson as a weapon.

The administration regularly violates the contract in Maspeth, teachers are NOT paid per session for "required" activities outside the school day such as mentoring meetings, chaperoning events, etc. A large majority of the staff are extremely young and untenured and will simply do as told even if it violates their rights. There are very few veteran staff in this building...wonder why... If you are older, tenured, and more vocal about your rights, administration will target you in any way possible. Veteran teachers need not apply.

 All teachers are regularly given four in a row teaching schedules and are expected to comply without protest. Of course the untenured newbies will do it and kiss ass to the admin for the sake of their job, but everyone else who dares to question it will become a target.

The school boasts a 100% graduation rate but the secret is that teachers cannot fail students. If you try to fail a student, admin will have their buddy buddy staff come into your classroom, yell and try to intimidate you into passing said students. Forget it if the student has an IEP. If you *dare* fail a student, you will not hear the end of it, and will be sat down by administration and their cronies in an effort to make you pass the student. Since its a well known thing that teachers cannot fail students (dubbed the "Maspeth Minimum"), students know that they could do no work all semester, and then ask for a packet of makeup work in the last marking period to get a passing grade in the course. This ultimately works against the teachers, because students will not listen to you when you tell them they are failing the course, or that they are in danger of failing the state exams (i.e. regents). Therefore, students who should have failed the course all year, passed, and then when they sat down for the exams in June, they had not a clue what to do and failed, because they were used to being handed 65's for minimal efforts. 

Teachers should beware of this school on the Open Market, they have high turnover but it is kept on the down low because of their inflated numbers that look great on paper. Much of what occurs in this school is toxic. The principal is like a mythical beast, you hear of him, but you never see him. Seniors in this school have no idea who he is since he never leaves his office. Instead of him being present, he has his 25 year old little suck up 2nd and 3rd year teachers who think they're masters acting like they run the place and DISRESPECTING staff whom are more experienced than they are!

Administration has their friends who act like spies and will look for anything and everything to get you, then run back to their admin friends and get you in trouble. many schools have problems with just administration, this school has problems with BOTH staff and administration. When people are pitted against one another, and teachers who have been in the DOE for many years are being suddenly given ineffective ratings after years of effectives and highly effectives because they happened to "say something about the wrong person" or ruffle someones feathers the wrong way, that is truly a toxic environment. 

Stay away from Maspeth High School. You can see "My Do Not Apply" list Here.

Queens High Schools That Students Avoid.

The 2md Round of 2018 high school student vacancies are now available and you can see the list Here. What is quite obvious is that the most student vacancies are in schools with a 90% or more Black and Hispanic student population.  Moreover, these high schools are academically struggling and many students are subject to poverty.  In addition, these schools have high ELL and Sp Ed populations as well as having high teacher turnover.  Finally, some high schools refused to show vacancies by claiming they are continuing to recruit students. To check other years from 2015 to 2017 you can find them Here, Here, and Here.

This is the list of Queens High Schools with the most student vacancies in the 2nd round.

School..............................................Vacancies

Long Island City.....................................535
John Adams...........................................455
Grover Cleveland....................................420 
William Cullen Bryant..............................250
Flushing.................................................245
Newtown................................................190
August Martin.........................................170
Martin Van Buren....................................160
International HS For Health Sciences........150 
Humanities And Arts...............................145
Hillcrest.................................................125
Pathways Collegiate Prep Academy..........120
George Washington Carver......................105
Mathematics, Science, and Tech..............100
HS of Law Enforcement.............................80
Benjamin Franklin....................................80 
Fredrick Douglas Academy VI....................80
Richmond Hill...........................................65
Excelsior Preparatory ..............................60
Queens Preparatory Academy...................60  
Rockaway Collegiate.................................60

If you look at the list you can see many of the schools are in Southeast Queens and Renewal Schools.

It needs to be noted that these vacancies are the minimum available since the DOE list stops at 40 vacancies.  Some of these schools might have double the amount of vacancies listed on the DOE website.

Read my other posts that list the Queens high schools that students avoid 2017, 2016, and 2015..  Here,  Here, and Here.

Flushing High School, How The DOE Destroyed A Potentially Great Neighborhood School.

Very soon, the entire staff of Flushing High School will reapply for their jobs thorough the 18D process that is simply a fig leaf for the DOE and Principal to choose who they want.  Not what's best for the students of the school.   The 18D process usually includes a committee that consists of three DOE employees, the Principal, a representative from Tweed, and another DOE representative, either from the Superintendent's office or an assistant principal from the school.  The other two come from the UFT, usually the District Representative and another from the Borough office.  The result is usually a 3 to 2 vote with the DOE holding the majority.

Because of Fair Student Funding and recession era school budgets, the 50% of staff members selected usually consists of the cheapest teachers and most of the lower paid employees like paraprofessionals, school aides, and support service personnel.  The only veteran teachers selected are the lead teacher of each subject area, while the rest are usually not selected.  The result is the majority of teachers selected are usually untenured and the rest will be new to the system.  Most veteran teachers will be jettisoned to the ATR pool.  The result is far less than 50% of the teachers will find themselves back at the school in their position next year.

The DOE decided that teachers are the blame for the poor results at Flushing High School and not the administration or the students.  Flushing High School has had six principals since 2011 and each one of them had issues.  One was  arrested with drugs near the school.  Another was found guilty by a jury for sexual harassment and retaliation, a third alienated the entire staff and fled to the suburbs.  The only one that lasted more than a year was removed for trying to interfere with teacher surveys and stopped a student newspaper from being published.  Let's not forget some of his questionable academic policies.   His claim to fame was calling the principal's job at the school like the "hunger games"You can read some of the issues with the previous principals Here, Here, and  Here.

 When it comes to the school, the student body is unrepresentative of the community.  Flushing High School is in the middle of Flashing's Chinatown and the neighborhood surrounding the school is 85% East Asian.   However, the school's student body is 80% Black and Hispanic with Asians only representing 17% of the student body.  Eliminate the South Asian students and the East Asian percentage is probably in the single digits.  I taught at the school in the 2011-12 school year and it was a real hellhole.  Read my post Here.  The majority of Black and Hispanic students that go to Flushing High School live many mikes from the school and can take up to two hours to arrive at the school from Southeast Queens or Elmhurst.  Showing up late or not at all is a common problem at the school.  Combine that with the large "high needs" population and it's no wonder that the academic problems persist at the school.

How does the DOE expect the school to improve with a relatively inexperienced staff and the same student body?  The answer is they don't.  The DOE just wants to reduce school salaries and push veteran teachers out of the system.  It's not about what's best for the students.

More ATRs On The Way As The City Is Planning To Close 14 Additional Schools.

The City announced today that 14 schools will close at the end of the school year and that means 4,500 students and 400 educators will be seeking a new school.  Of thee 14 schools over half are in the Bronx (8) with Brooklyn (2), Manhattan (2), and Queens (2) providing the rest.  Of the 14 schools closing 9 are Renewal Schools.  In addition 4 other schools will merge with another school, with 2 of the 4 located in the Bronx and 2 in Brooklyn.  Some of these educators will also be dumped into the ATR pool.

Add the 400+ educators that will no longer have a position with previously announced staff shakeups at DeWitt Clinton and Flushing High Schools, and there could be an influx of up to 500 more educators to the ATR pool. Since the ATR incentives have been a failure, I suspect that the DOE's program to reduce the ATR pool us simply a pipe dream.

The list of schools that are closing or being merged with other schools are as follows:

The nine Renewal schools the city plans to close are:

• P.S. 50 Vito Marcantonio (District 4)
• Coalition School for Social Change (District 4)
• High School for Health Careers and Sciences (District 6)
• New Explorers High School (District 7)
• Urban Science Academy (District 9)
• P.S. 92 Bronx School (District 12)
• Brooklyn Collegiate: A College Board School (District 23)
• P.S./M.S. 42 R. Vernam (District 27)
• M.S. 53 Brian Piccolo (District 27)

The five other schools the city plans to close are:

• KAPPA IV (District 5)
• Academy for Social Action (District 5)
• Felisa Rincon de Gautier Institute (District 8)
• Urban Assembly School for Wildlife Conservation (District 12)
• Eubie Blake School (District 16)

The schools the city plans to merge are:

• Holcombe L. Rucker School of Community (District 8), becoming part of Longwood Preparatory Academy, another Renewal school
• Entrada Academy (District 12) into Accion Academy
• Middle School of Marketing and Legal Studies (District 18) into East Flatbush Community and Research School
• Middle school grades of Gregory Jocko Jackson School (District 23) into Brownsville Collaborative Middle School

Maybe, the influx of new ATRs will finally convince the DOE to come up with a better ATR buyout and to eliminate school based fair student funding.

Queens High Schools Not Ready For College.

High schools with low college readiness rates are usually associated with schools that have a high percentage of Black and Hispanic student bodies and are located in high poverty areas.  This appears to be true when it comes to the Queens high schools.  Of the thirteen schools that have the lowest college readiness scores, all but one, Flushing high school, a Renewal School, are located in Southeast Queens.  For the remaining twelve high schools the Black and Hispanic population is over 90% and diversity is simply a pipe dream under the current high school choice program.  



School............................College Readiness

Fredrick Douglas Academy VI......13%
Rockaway Park...........................16%
Humanities and Arts...................19%
August Martin............................20% 
Law Enforcement.......................20%
Flushing....................................22%
Rockaway Collegiate..................23% 
QIRT.........................................25%
Excelsior Prep...........................25% 
Pathways College......................26% 
Science, Research, and Tech......26%
Cambria Heights Academy.........27% 
Academy of Medical Tech...........27% 

Basically, only one in every four students are academically proficient and this does not bode well for the remaining 75% of the students who must continue to struggle academically.  Moreover, with the lack of proper academic skills and work habits, these students will;l have trouble finding and maintaining jobs, provide financially for a family, and establish a stable home environment for their children.

Unless we diversify these schools and attract academically proficient students, the above schools are simply awarding useless diplomas to students who are unwilling or unable to become academically proficient to become a successful adult. These schools are simply diploma mills and we are doing a disservice to these students by awarding them a useless diploma when they are unprepared for both higher education and the adult work world.

Coming To A High School In Your Neighbohood, More ATRs For The Bronx And Queens.

The Chancellor, Carmen Farina, has informed  226 teachers and other staff members that two Renewal high schools, DeWitt Clinton in the Bronx ( 96 staff) and Flushing high school (128 staff) in Queens, will have to reapply for their positions and add significantly to next year's ATR pool.  The two schools continue to struggle academically and were targeted by the DOE for poor performance.  Chalkbeat also has an article.

To be fair, both Renewal high schools have become a dumping ground for the Borough's students who have failed to land placements in other schools. Moreover, both Renewal Schools have high percentages of English Language Learners and Special Education students who usually have academic issues,  Finally, both schools have unstable administrations with the Principal of DeWitt Clinton, Santiago Taveras, accused of grade fixing and removed last November, while the Flushing High School Principal,  Tyee Chin, also accused of grade fixing removed this week.  Below are the latest statistics for the two schools.

School.....................ELL........Sp Ed....College Ready

DeWitt Clinton.........22%........18%...........19%
Flushing..................20%........14%...........18%

Just as important both schools  have high rates of chronically absent students, with DeWitt Clinton having 45% and Flushing 39%, which is down from the previous year's 46%.  The City average is 30%. and you can find the information in the latest snapshot for 2016-17 school year. 

You can read the stories on the two recently removed principals Here and  Here.

My understanding of the rules is that teachers not selected by the two schools for next school year will join the ATR pool but will be assigned to one school fore the school year and will only switch schools if the Principal requested his or her removal.  Expect most teachers who have 5 years or more experience in the two Renewal Schools to be excessed under the bogus 18D process.

The bottom line is that up to 150 teachers will be new additions to the ATR pool for the 2018-19 school year.  I guess DOE's draining the pool  is simply a pipe dream.

Queens High Schools That Students Avoid.

One of the most informative data that tells a parent and child which schools to select and which one to avoid is the amount of vacancies a school has  Schools with vacancies are a warning sign that the school is not academically appropriate for an academically proficient child. While many Queens high schools still had vacancies after the first round, the largest amount of vacancies were reported at the Renewal High Schools and the schools located in Southeast Queens.  The list below are the "dirty dozen" of schools that had the largest amount of vacancies and should be avoided at all costs.

High School..................Vacancies

Long Island City................570
John Adams......................500
Grover Cleveland..............405
Flushing...........................230
August Martin...................200
Newtown..........................195
Hillcrest............................160
Martin Van Buren..............175
Humanities & Arts.............165
Rockaway Park..................130
William Cullen Bryant........120
Math, Science, Research....110

For all high schools in New York City ou can find the complete list for 2017 Here.  Also the previous lists for 2016 and 2015 can be found Here and Here.

The vacancies for August Martin was significantly reduced from last year due to the downsizing of the school, while the highest vacancies were associated with the Renewal Schools.  The highest amount of vacancies, relative to their size can be found at Campus Magnet which had a total of 425 vacancies as all four schools have had trouble attracting students due to their poor reputation.   The schools with many vacancies are prome candidates of receiving "over-the-counter" students who are usually "high needs" with limited academic or language skills/

To help you with your school selection search please read my posts about Queens high schools to avoid in 2016 and 2015 Here and Here.

Do Not Apply To These Queens High Schools.

Now that the school year is a week away, here is a list of Queens High Schools that ATRs should try to stay clear of, if possible. Previously, blogger JD2718 had published a list of Bronx High Schools and you can find it here.

List of schools on my "do not apply" list.

High School....................................Reason
William Cullen Bryant.......................Principal
Cambria Heights Academy................Principal
Campus Magnet Schools..................Administration
Queens Preparatory Academy...........Principal
Applied Communications..................Principal
Gateway To The Health Sciences......Principal
Beach Channel Campus...................Administration
Queens Collegiate...........................Principal
Renewal Schools............................Academics
August Martin................................Academics
Far Rockaway Campus.....................Academics
Martin Van Buren............................Safety 
High School of Teaching...................Administration
Pathways To College.......................Safety/Academics
Metropolitan..................................Administration
Maspeth.......................................Principal/Staff 

There are some other high schools that merit being on the list.  However, those schools recently changed principals so its unfair to include them on my "do not apply" list.

Bad Teacher? Maybe. Bad School? Absolutely!

Over the last couple of months a 25 year veteran teacher was accused of corporal punishment and ended up being arrested and getting a 30-day jail sentence for shoving a 7-year old child that didn't result in any physical injuries to the child and wasn't reported for a month.  While the teacher has had letters of reprimand for previous corporal punishment and verbal abuse, none rose to the level of a 3020-a termination hearing, least not being arrested for.   In 2013, the teacher was accessed previously of  a serious corporal punishment incident.  However, the charge was found to be unsubstantiated and dismissed.  All the rest were minor and simply resulted in a letter of reprimand at worst.

The real story begins with the elementary school itself  PS 194, Countee Cullen in Harlem between 2008 and 2012 there were 200 reported violent incidents and six sex offenses and this is an elementary school!  Moreover, the Principal during that time had a habit of not reporting incidents and coming in late you can read it Here.  You can also  see the YouTube video Here. 

Things have not improved under the new Principal as the high poverty and 95% Black and Hispanic student body still struggles academically and teachers gave the Principal an 18% trust factor, one of the lowest in the City .  Moreover,  only 24% think the Principal clearly communicates her vision.  Finally, the Math and English scores remain in single digits of 9% and 7% respectively, again,  one of the lowest in the City as the school has been among the list of violent schools. You can see the school's snapshot Here. This is what the teacher said of his school

“PS 194 has been a constant member of the most dangerous schools — it is a school where we have a lot of students with real problems that are not addressed,“ Couey had said.


In fact, the other teachers agree with him, according to the school's snapshot only 7% of the teachers feel the students are safe in the school while the City average is 94%!

 When it comes to the child in question, you can read a slightly more informative take by the New York Post.   Obviously, the child has serious behavioral issues that were not adequately addressed by the school administration.  Like how does a school allow a 7-year old child to run the hallways unattended during class time?  Where did he go without permission and why wasn't he disciplined by an administrator?  Why didn't the teacher have a co-teacher in a classroom with Special Education students as required by law?  If the child was diagnosed with ADHD and autism, as the Daily News article stated, what services, if any,  did the school supply to the child?

The teacher spent his entire 25-year career at the academically struggling and dangerous school and stayed when other teachers left for better schools and more respect and he was rewarded for his loyalty to the school with not only an arrest and a 30 day jail sentence but a 3020-a charge to terminate his employment.  Just because he tried to discipline a misbehaving student because nobody else wanted to bother with the child.

Is he a bad teacher?  Maybe to some people who don't understand what's its like to teach in such a hostile and chaotic environment without administrative support and where a single slip up can cost a teacher their job.   You can make your own decision on that.  However, is PS 194 a bad school?   No question about it.  Absolutely it is.

John Bowne High School Has Become More Dangerous For Students.

John Bowne High School is a high school thatis located in a leafy Middle-class neighborhood in Flushing and has a diverse student body and theoretically should be an attractive high school for students.  However, there has been a disturbing spike in violent incidents and weapon confiscations at the troubled school.over the last three years.  Just last week, a student was knifed by two other students at the school, a police officer was punched by another student,and the Principal Howard Kwait has cost the DOE over $500,000 in settling two lawsuits by female assistant Principals and a female student who was falsely arrested.  Moreover, he was fined by the City's Conflict of Interest Board by accepting a trip by a female subordinate overseas.  Finally, Mr. Kwait has been accused of changing grades, and retaliating against whistle-blowers which resulted in another lawsuit by a male Assistant Principal this year.  You can read all the unsavory details Here, Here, Here, and Here.

While the school has some great programs in Agricultural and Veterinary Science, it struggles when it comes to their "college and career readiness" scores which is below the citywide average.   You can see the school's snapshot.

The student population of the school is half Hispanic, and one quarter Black and the other quarter Asian, mostly South Asian. Many of the neighborhood's middle-class students that would normally go to John Bowne High School if high school zoning was still in force, end up in the nearby better schools of Francis Lewis, Thomas Edison, and Forest Hills.  Instead many of the student body come from Southern Queens and unfortunately, brings with them the culture of violence and disrespect for authority.  With Martin Van Buren a Renewal School and the Jamaica campus schools deteriorating and not attracting students from their neighborhoods, John Bowne continues to get many of these lower academic achieving students and hence, a rise in violent incidents and weapon possession.

Are the high schools becoming safer?  Yeah right and I have a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you.

More Academic Fraud At Flushing High School.

Once again another disgusting case of academic fraud has shown up at a Renewal School.  This time its Flushing high school where students who passed the Algebra class because of the Principal's directive that 75% must pass, including no shows, or the teacher will be given an "ineffective" rating.  However, most failed the Algebra Regents which is necessary to graduate high school.  Since the Algebra Regents is the easiest to pass of all the Math Regents, instead of requiring the students to take the Algebra class over or arrange tutoring for the next Regents this is what the Principal, Tyee Chin, did instead.

Mr. Chin and his assistant Principal in Math arranged for the students to take the Algebra class over again but coded it as a Geometry class so to give the students a phony Geometry credit rather than give them a no-credit Algebra course.  This was academic fraud as it was a blatant attempt to raise the graduation rate and to show academic improvement when there was no merit.

Five teachers wrote to the Special Commissioner of Investigations (SCI) about the academic fraud who inexplicably sent it to the DOE's Office of Special Investigations (OSI) where it lies buried as the Principal is still running the school.

Principal Chin's trust factor is only 46%, that means the majority of teachers find him untrustworthy and when you consider he tried to get staff to rate him and the school favorably and was disciplined for the intent to spike the school survey, you can guess his untrustworthiness is probably even higher.  At the end of last school year Principal Chin send the Flushing staff a "Hunger Games" letter that in part, said the following:

— “Don’t trust anyone,” he says he was advised when he began — and said that after a year, “there are still those who refuse to put down the war cry for a new principal.”

Furthermore, he took a threatening student's side and instead reassigned a teacher who was threatened.

Mr. Chin, is another failed Principal and how these "bad pennies" continue to show up to run schools is beyond me.  He failed to turnaround his Harlem School and left after three years.  Now  Mr. Chin was allegedly seen applying for the Townsend Harris position, talking about going from bad to worse at the school if Mr. Chin is the new Principal?

Unfortunately, this is not the first allegation of academic fraud at Flushing High School.  In Mr. Chin's first year as Principal the school  was accused of graduating 150 students using a quickie online course program. How can the Mayor and Chancellor close their collective eyes and allow these bad principals to commit academic fraud and remain in charge of schools is just unbelievable to me.

Inside The Numbers Of The Poor College And Career Readness Rates At These Diploma Mill Schools.

In today's New York Post an article identified the high schools with high graduation rates and low "college and career readiness" rates.  Not surprisingly, all of the schools are concentrated in two Boroughs.  The Bronx and Brooklyn.  Many of the schools are themed Bloomberg small schools which suffer from high teacher turnover.   The list is found below.

School................................Graduation Rate.....College Ready
FDNY Fire & Safety..................83.3%....................1.9%
Urban Assembly......................82.5%....................3.8%
School For Music & Theatre......89.5%..................11.8%
Eagle Academy For Men II.......88.7%...................14.1%
Law & Community Service........80.6%...................6.5%
Academy For Young Writers.....86.3%..................12.3%
George Westinghouse..............81.1%...................7.6%
Victory Collegiate....................76.0%...................2.7%
Bronxdale...............................76.0%...................4.0%
New Visions  Humanities..........86.0%...................1.2%
 ..
However, if one is to break down the school statistics you can find many other commonalities with the schools listed above.  Let's look at what these diploma mill factories have in common.

Student Body:
The student body is usually over 95% minority and a high percentage receive free lunch, a marker for deep poverty.  Moreover, the schools tend to be male dominated.  Finally, many of these schools have a much higher percentage of "high needs" students than the average school in the City..

Teachers:
The schools identified have a majority of untenured teachers and are subject to high teacher turnover as teachers flee these schools when the Open Market Transfer System opens up for the summer..

Chronic Absentees:
All these schools suffer from a high percentage of chronic student absenteeism and student discipline is an ongoing problem.

Unsafe Neighborhoods:
The majority of the high schools are located in neighborhoods that are high poverty and considered unsafe.

The bottom line is that until the schools have a stable teaching staff, s stringent and enforced student discipline code, and a more diverse student body.  These schools will be the poster schools for diploma mills that simply push out students who are unprepared for post secondary education and the adult world.

For all unscreened high schools in Queens you can find it Here.